Woody Harrelson seemingly reveals the name of his Han Solo character

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Ever since it was announced that Woody Harrelson had been cast in the role of Han Solo's mentor in the upcoming Star Wars anthology movie focusing on the exploits of the young smuggler, fans have been itching to learn the name of his character.

While fans posited at first that Harrelson had come on board as a variation of Alexsandr Badure from the books’ Expanded Universe (which are no longer canon, but with Disney bringing over Grand Admiral Thrawn into the official Star Wars universe, anything’s possible), the fact that Harrelson later revealed his character was a criminal led to some people speculating instead that he was playing Garris Shrike. And … lo and behold! It looks like they were right.

During a video interview with Variety, Harrelson was asked point blank if he was indeed playing Garris Shrike. While the actor was hesitant at first to confirm (or even deny) the information, Harrelson seemingly confirmed the news with a simple yes.

In the Expanded Universe, Shrike was a criminal and former bounty hunter who raised a group of orphans to teach them the tricks of the trade (thievery being one of them). A young Han Solo was one of those orphans whom Shrike rescued from the streets, but the young scoundrel-in-the-making left Shrike after suffering abuse (he was sometimes severely beaten) at the hands of his mentor.

It's unknown how much of the book character's backstory will carry over to the movie (if Harrelson is indeed playing Garris Shrike, but yeah, he probably is), so it'll be interesting to see how Disney/Lucasfilm will choose to portray him.

Directed by Phil Lord and Chris Miller (The LEGO Movie) from a screenplay by the father-and-son duo of Lawrence and Jon Kasdan, the untitled Han Solo movie stars Alden Ehrenreich as Han, Donald Glover as Lando Calrissian and Emilia Clarke. The movie is currently slated for a May 25, 2018, release, though it's been recently rumored that it may get pushed to December 2018.